Urban Farm Runoff and Prevention
Because of their population densities, and thus use and waste of resources, cities are the sources for many environmental challenges such as issues with stormwater runoff that is tainted with pollutants and chemicals 1. With the growth of cities becoming more prevalent in most recent decades, managing this stormwater runoff in order to prevent flooding and nutrient pollution will be of key importance of urban planning practices. One way to go about solving these challenges is the incorporation of urban farms, a practice that has greatly increased in the past decade. Urban farms can allow for better access to locally grown and nutritious produce, better opportunities for building community morale and forming relationships among neighbors, increased quality of life through being involved in recreational and active gardening techniques, and also increasing awareness of personal dependence on our surrounding environment and how to treat it respectfully 2. All of these benefits are important, but one in particular to keep in mind is the role urban farms serve to provide a stormwater infiltration system, thus reducing erosion and soil runoff, if they are implemented properly. If these farms are poorly managed, they can instead have the negative effect of serving as sources for sediment pollution. Moving Forward With global change being such an important issue, the amount and frequency of rainfall across the globe has been increasing and will continue to increase with the warming of our world. With this increased rainfall, reducing erosion and soil runoff will be a key focus for the agricultural community. To make these urban farms useful for these purposes, specific management practices and techniques for the set-up of these farms will be important. In building these efficient urban farms, it will be important to derive knowledge from other areas like the techniques used in large-scale agriculture and also local construction projects to be able to implement similar practices in reducing runoff from the soil that have a lot of contaminants and pollutants from the cities 2. Also, the fact that the soil of urban settings is often highly compacted, it will be important to put into place practices such as deep-tilling and composting to allow for increased water-holding capacity, which further reduces soil and water runoff, and allows for nutrient utilization of the soil 1. Additional systems can be put into place to test for contaminants in the soil , and upon finding these potential runoff contaminants, simple measures can be taken to either remove them or make them less mobile in the soil. One simple measure is the use of compost to reduce the mobility of harmful metals such as lead or mercury and also decrease the uptake of these metals by the plants in the urban farm by making more useful and necessary nutrients available to the plants instead 2. By having the city planner and members involved with the implementation of these urban farming systems aware of these important practices, it is completely feasible for urban agriculture to positively contribute to the reduction of soil runoff and erosion in the urban centers of the Upper Midwest. Sources: [1]Knizhnik, Heather L. "The Environmental Benefits of Urban Agriculture on Unused, Impermeable, and Semi-Permeable Spaces in Major Cities, with a Focus on Philadelphia, PA." UPenn.edu. ''University of Pennsylvania, 01 Aug. 2012. Web. 13 March 2014. [2] "Urban Agriculture as a Green Stormwater Management Strategy." ''UMN.edu. The Freshwater Society and The Mississippi Watershed Management Organization, Feb. 2013. Web. 13 Mar. 2014.